Google moves SC after NCLAT refuses to stay CCI's Rs 1,338-crore penalty order

Google has moved Supreme Court to challenge the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) order refusing to stay the Competition Commission of India (CCI)'s Rs 1,338 crore penalty on the company, CNBC -TV18 reported on January 7.

The search giant is set to argue that parts of the CCI order have been plagiarized from Competition proceedings in European Union and that the order is 'extraordinary' and suffers from 'errors', CNBC-TV 8 report added.

Further, the Alphabet unit is also set to argue that Android's open system makes phones more affordable, Android enables more than 15,000 models across 1,100 OEMs (Original equipment manufacturers).

The antitrust agency had in October last year slapped a penalty of Rs 1,337.76 crore on Google for exploiting its dominant position in the market for Android which powers 97 percent of smartphones in India, a key growth region for the US giant. In the October ruling, CCI had also ordered the internet major to cease and desist from various unfair business practices.

Earlier this week, NCLAT had declined to stay the order passed by the CCI, after observing that the order was passed on October 20, 2022, but the appeal against it was filed on December 20, 2022.

The NCLAT had also directed Google to deposit 10 percent of the penalty amount within three weeks.

The CCI penalty was challenged by Google before NCLAT, which is an appellate authority over the CCI against any direction issued by the regulator.

However, the NCLAT denied any immediate relief and said: ''We are of the opinion that at the moment, considering the voluminous nature of the appeal and the fact that the date of the final hearing is fixed on April 3, 2023, there is no need to pass any interim order.''

In its petition before NCLAT, Google had termed as ''tainted'' the investigations done against it by CCI, contending that the two informants on whose complaint the fair trade regulator has initiated the enquiry were working at the same office that was investigating the tech major.

It also raised the issue of the absence of a judicial member at CCI and said, a final decision should only have been passed in this case by a quorum which includes a judicial member.